The New York Times wrote of The Secret Garden, “Many authors can write delightful books for children; a few can write entertaining books about children for adults; but it is only the exceptional author who can write a book about children with sufficient skill, charm, simplicity, and significance to make it acceptable to both young and old.” Perhaps this quality of being a book that appeals to children but remains pleasurable for adult readers is the key to the remarkable, enduring popularity of this Edwardian story of horticultural redemption for its protagonists, a cross, unlovely little girl, brought from India to an unfamiliar England, and a sickly boy given to temper tantrums.
This Broadview Edition provides extensive historical materials related to the novel’s publication and reception, as well as up-to-date and nuanced critical context.
Comments
“Shelley King and Heather Cyr’s edition of The Secret Garden is a delight. Their spotlessly edited text is accompanied by a treasure-trove of footnotes on a myriad of topics, including historical connections, literary references, definitions of lesser-known words, and textual variations. The introduction and appendices provide insights into views of childhood, gardens, colonialism, gender, and class that situate the novel within its cultural contexts. Such a wealth of material and its accessible presentation make this volume an equally welcome addition to not only Burnett scholarship but also libraries, classrooms, and personal collections.” — Anne Hiebert Alton, Central Michigan University
“King and Cyr’s invaluable new edition thoroughly situates The Secret Garden in its socio-cultural contexts. They have assembled a riveting selection of documents in five appendices, with introductions that guide readers through texts highlighting Burnett’s comprehensive understanding of the England in which she lived, its colonial past, and her forward thinking on issues and ideologies of gender, class, wellness, disability, and the natural world. The thoughtful introduction and meticulously edited and annotated novel enhance our ability to understand and enjoy this children’s classic and make this edition an essential resource for the classroom.” — Roxanne Harde, University of Alberta
List of Figures
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Frances Hodgson Burnett: A Brief Chronology
A Note on the Text
The Secret Garden
Appendix A: Reception and Reviews
- “A New Novel,” Ocala Evening Star (24 October 1910)
- “Literary and Trade Notes,” Publishers’ Weekly (15 July 1911)
- “A Guide to The New Books,” Literary Digest (2 September 1911)
- From “What Was Hid in a Garden,” The New York Times (3 September 1911)
- “The New Books,” Outlook(16 September 1911)
- From “New Books,” The American Monthly Magazine (1911)
- From “Notable New Canadian Books—Novels by R.E. Knowles and Frances Hodgson Burnett—Books of the Season,” The Globe (14 October 1911)
- From “New Novels,” The Athenaeum (1911)
- From Katharine Tynan, “In Fairy-Book Land,” The Bookman (1911)
Appendix B: The Romantic Child, the British Colonial Child, and the Disabled Child
- From Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Émile, ou de l’éducation [Émile, or Treatise on Education] (1762)
- From William Wordsworth, “Ode: Intimations of Immortality” (c. 1807)
- From Mrs. Ernest Ames, An ABC, for Baby Patriots (1899)
- Robert Louis Stevenson, “Foreign Children,” A Child’s Garden of Verses (1885)
- From Mary Martha Sherwood, History of Little Henry and his Bearer (1814)
- From Juliana Horatia Ewing, Six to Sixteen: A Story for Girls (1886)
- From Edmund C.P. Hull and R.S. Mair, The European in India (1878)
- “The Great Exhibition,” The Times [London] (14 May 1851)
- From Dinah Maria Mulock [Mrs. G.L. Craik], The Little Lame Prince and His Travelling Cloak (1875)
- From Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Land of the Blue Flower (1909)
- From Juliana Horatia Ewing, The Story of a Short Life (1885)
Appendix C: Gardens, Gardening, and the Natural World
Flora
- 1. Mrs. Burnett’s Gardens,” The Sun (16 September 1911)
- 2. From Frances Hodgson Burnett, The One I Knew the Best of All (1893)
- 3. From Frances Hodgson Burnett, In the Garden (1924)
- 4. From Juliana Horatia Ewing, Mary’s Meadow (1886)
- 5. From Gertrude Jekyll, Children and Gardens (1908)
Fauna
- 6. From Sarah Trimmer, Fabulous Histories, Designed for the Instruction of Children Respecting Their Treatment of Animals (1786)
- 7. From Frances Hodgson Burnett, My Robin (1912)
- 8. From Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows (1908)
Appendix D: Fitness, New Thought, and Nature’s Healing
- From UK Board of Education, The Syllabus of Physical Exercises for Public Elementary Schools 1909 (1909)
- From Dr. Helen Densmore, “History of Mind Cure,” Hall’s Journal of Health (May 1888)
- 3. From Anna B. Newman, “Mind Cure, No. 2: Course of Study as Taught by Mrs. Newman, of Boston,” Hall’s Journal of Health (June 1888)
Appendix E: Ideologies of Gender and Class
- From Robert Chambers, “The Idea of an English Girl,” Chambers’s Edinburgh Journal (12 July 1834)
- From John Ruskin, “Of Queen’s Gardens,” Sesame and Lilies (1889)
- From R.M. Ballantyne, The Gorilla Hunters (1861)
- From Hannah More, The Shepherd of Salisbury Plain, [Cheap Repository Tracts 1795] (1859)
- From Frances Hodgson Burnett, A Little Princess (1905)
Appendix F: A Note on Adaptations
Works Cited and Select Bibliography
Shelley King is Professor Emerita of English at Queen’s University. Heather K. Cyr is Chair of the English Department at Kwantlen Polytechnic University.
